Jigsaw puzzle
by solaas
Summary: What might happen if the Archangel of Creation finally got his mitts on the Demon Prince of Lust? Eli and Andrealphus duke it out, but not the way one might think. (In Nomine)


Andrealpus shrieked in fury and tore his hands through the flailing Balseraph, pushing and wrenching at its Forces, pulling them from each other with as much slow, tearing pain as he was able to. You think Asmodeus is well versed in torture? No, the Game has a long way to go before it reaches the skill that the enraged Prince of Lust has. Andrealpus is all about sensation, after all.

But this violent scene of torture wasn't helping. It only made him feel _worse_; angrier, sadder, sicker, more helpless.

The Balseraph writhed in agony, but its eyes -- the four it had left -- were locked on its Prince. The Beautiful Prince, whom it loved with all its being. True, painful, terminal love.

Andrealphus screamed again, and smashed the offending serpent onto the floor, crushing its head under a solid heel. He had no words fit for expressing the pain and the rage and the utter insanity that his existence had become. Only the primal sounds of mindless fury escaped him, because if he didn't scream he was sure to explode and dissolve into nothingness.

They had betrayed him! His own children, his own servitors -- they had all committed the ultimate sin and they were tearing him apart, pulling his very self asunder and rendering his Word a mere detail. Just a piece of a larger jigsaw puzzle; one he himself had razed and burned an eternity ago. Andrealphus couldn't bear to formulate the word to himself, but they were doing it. His Heart was straining under the assault from all those demons who ... who... No. He couldn't say it, couldn't think it.

IT COULD NOT BE!

He nearly doubled over in shock, as a stabbing sensation manifested through all his Forces. The stench of blood suddenly filled his nostrils, and it nearly made him gag. Andrealpus looked around wildly, trying to discern what was happening. All around him demons poured in, throwing themselves at him; pawing, fawning, grabbing, stroking, begging. On they came like a tidal wave of maddened devotion, only for him -- all for him. No matter how he laid about him, tearing them limb from limb, annihilating fledgeling and loyal Wordbound alike, they just kept on swarming him.

Another stab burned through him, and he fell heavily to his knees, hugging his arms tight around him and spreading his wings to cover himself like a cloak. He poured all his will into turning pain to pleasure, and for a few moments it worked. Those few moments of respide allowed him to sense the acute danger his Heart was in.

The first thing Andrealphus saw when he appeared by his Heart, was his most hated enemy. Eli, Archangel of Creation was _there, in his Heart-room_! The next thing Andrealphus saw, was that Lilith, Princess of Freedom was there too. Unlike Eli, she was smiling. A chilly, bitter smile laced with exilerated triumph. The third thing Andrealpus saw, was the dying demons who were being burned alive trying to rip and crush his Heart to pieces.

He was about to launch himself directly at Eli, but the Archangel held up a finger to stop him. "Just a moment, Andrea, we're nearly there."

Andrealphus hesitated for one fatal moment.

"Are you ready?" Eli asked the room at large.

"Yes!" chorused a multitude of voices.

"Then may your sacrifice never be forgotten, and your Forces rest in the Glory."

With that, Eli spread his arms out and made a gesture as if embracing something huge, gathering it within his arms and then his hands. Andrealphus felt his entire Bordello tremble, as a sigh stormed through it. A shimmering, golden force materialized between Eli's hands and took the shape of a stonecarver's hammer.

The turning of the world seemed to slow down to stop-motion, as Andrealphus tried to throw himself over his Heart to stop Eli from putting the hammer to it. It turned out he'd hesitated just one moment too long...

Eli swung and the hammer soared through eternity and Andrealphus screamed and Lilith laughed and the hammer struck the Heart of Lust and thousands of demons ceased to be and Andrealphus screamed and screamed and his Heart shattered into a thousand pieces and he was ripped from himself and slung out into a void where he lost himself completely.

---

Andrealphus came to without any sense of how long he'd been blacked out, nor did he have the faintest idea of where he was. However Eli was standing over him, gazing patiently down at his face, waiting.

"You are my prisoner now, Andrea, and I have two tasks for you," Eli told him.

Andrealphus hissed in defiance and sat up. "Screw you!"

"Not quite yet, Andrea dear. Do you want to die?" Eli asked calmly.

Andrealpus glared mutinously at the Archangel.

"That is your only other option, you know," Eli informed him in a far too relaxed manner. Furious bile rose in Andrealphus's throat, and he bared his teeth.

"You can either do these tasks that I give you, or you can die. It's a win-win situation, my dear."

Andrealphus knew when he was outmatched, and this was it. He'd have to stall for time to think up a way out of this desperate predicament. "What tasks?" he ground out huskily.

"Follow me," said Eli and walked over to a work bench. Andrealphus got up and stalked after him, mind on fire with one plan of murderous escape after the other.

Eli produced two velvety bags, one large and one somewhat smaller, out of thin air, and Andrealphus sensed powerful artifacts within. Disturbingly familiar-feeling artifacts. The Archangel dumped their contents in two separate heaps on the desk. Two glittering, sparkling heaps.

Andrealphus stared at them for a while, speechless.

"I assume you recognize these?" Eli asked.

"Heart shards," Andrealphus answered.

"Yes, Heart shards. Yours. I've kept these old ones since you Fell, and relicized them to make sure they stayed intact. This other heap is new, and lemme tell you, they were a right bitch to preserve."

Andrealpus continued to stare at the heaps of shimmering crystal. "And the task?"

"The tasks," Eli carefully emphasized the plural s, "Are to put these back together. Like building model ships or airplanes, only these're broken Hearts. Take it or leave it, I'll be back tomorrow to see what you've decided," Eli said and vanished.

One year later, Andrealpus was done. He'd painstakingly rebuilt both his ruined Hearts, and the relics now rested on the workbench. They weren't real Hearts anymore, of course; only dead reconstructions of things that had been. They were both crystalline and both quite big, but one was significantly larger than the other.

Eli stood on the opposite side of the desk, studying the results. He nodded slowly. "Good job, Andrea. They seem to be nicely puzzled together." He paused and adjusted the big crystals to what he obviously thought of as better positions.

Andrealphus snorted sourly. It was a pointless damned task, it had taken him too damned long and he'd be left with no damned entities to please himself with for a full, damned YEAR!

Eli gestured to the two hearts. "Study them carefully, Andrea, and tell me what you see."

Andrealphus hissed an impotent warning at Eli, but under the Archangel's calm, patient gaze he gave up and eyed the stupid hearts instead. He glared at them for a long while, desperately trying to guess what it was Eli wanted him to tell him.

Then he saw it, and was not amused.

"Well?" Eli prodded.

Silence reigned a stretched out moment, then Andrealphus answered in a curt, bitter voice. "They're mirror images."

"Indeed."

"Except for the size. The oldest one is larger."

"Why is that, do you think?"

"Fuck you."

"No."

More silence followed, but Andrealphus had decided he'd had enough conversation. This wasn't to his liking at all, so he just glowered sullenly, not giving in to the urge to rub himself against the table. Not with _him_ there. Not with _him_ ignoring it.

Eli sighed. "Very well." Then he produced the hammer he'd used to break the Heart of Lust, and without more ado he smashed the reconstructed Heart of Love with it.

"What the fuck did you do that for, you crazy bastard?!" Andrealphus snapped. He masked his surprise with anger, and did his best to quell the disturbed clenching in the pit of his stomach.

Eli didn't answer, but started to puzzle the pieces together with quick, experienced fingers. Beautiful, slender, precise, gentle fingers. The Hearbroken Prince watched suspiciously as the Archangel of Creation worked. Soon it became evident that this version of the Heart-model would be much, much bigger than the one Andrealphus had built.

When he was done, Eli placed it in the middle of the table. "Here's how it looks when it's been put together correctly," he said.

Andreaphus eyed it unhappily. Eli was right, of course. It had the proper size now, but ... there were also portions missing, and Andrealphus didn't want to contemplate that fact. Unfortunately for him, Eli did.

With a gut-wrenching crash, Eli shattered the other Heart-model too. "You're an intelligent celestial, Andrea, so you know what your next task is," he said with a faint smile and left.

An unholy scream shook the walls of Andrealphus's prison, but to no avail. Sounds of rampaging fits of fury could be heard from his rooms, but if there were anyone around to listen, they didn't react.

Andrealphus raged and howled and clawed at the walls and threw the heart shards all over the place and hurled the model at the wall where it exploded into its separate components and he tore and stroked at himself and tried to drown himself in one sensation after the other and cut himself with the shards until he bled just to forget forget forget I am Lust damn you all! I AM LUST DAMN YOU ALL!

Then he spent years in sullen silence, sitting still as a statue in the middle of the ruined room, where only splinters were left of the work bench. His beautiful appearance sported scars from the cutting, but he didn't care. There were no mirrors, and it wasn't as if he'd ever get out of this place. Eli had left, and there had been no sight or sound of him for years. It felt like years.

In the end, desperate from boredom and desperate for contact with anyone, anything, even Eli, Andrealphus caved in and began to pick up the pieces that were strewn all around. Slowly, painstakingly, he started to work out the puzzle. He knew what Eli wanted him to do, and perhaps if he did it, Eli would know and would come to see if ... if... At least there was a _chance_ to get a moment or two of company, however unsatisfying. Perhaps if he was good, Eli would reward him.

Andrealphus had no idea which shards belonged to which Heart anymore, but it hardly mattered. He carefully reconstructed the old Heart of Love, section by tiny section. The sensation of the crystal shards between his fingers, and the surfaces materializing under his hands were pleasing, but far, far too faint.

It took him eleven years to rebuild the Heart, and when he was done he sat back and stared at it, hypnotized. It was a thing of such breath-taking beauty as Andrealphus hadn't seen since this very Heart broke and fell apart for the first time, and now it was rebuilt.

But it was a lifeless, preserved beauty -- like a swan stuffed and mounted on the wall. There was no light in it, no warmth, no home. It was all wrong, and still it mesmerized him as he sat there. A yearning broke free of thousands of years' worth of lies and deception. It made him gather up the lifeless crystal in his arms and hold it tight to him. It had been the living embodient of Love, and now it was there, in his arms, dead.

Andrealphus stared into the empthy depths of the crystal, not seeing anything but clear, gleaming perfection. A shiver ran through him, and then it ran back again. And then another followed, and another and soon he was trembling with he didn't know what, but he hoped _something_ would give soon becuase he wasn't sure he could contain whatever it was for much longer.

When the first tear fell on the crystal cradeled in Lusts arms, it made no sound. Soon, it was followed by more tears and they poured over the empty Heart, slowly gathering into its crevices and dripping down its peaks and valleys. Andrealphus dissolved into sobs as he curled himself around his old Heart, and he wept for a long, long time, losing himself in grief.

The next thing Andrealphus knew, was that a gentle hand was stroking his hair. Eli had returned at some point, and had sat down next to the crying demon. Now he caressed Andrealphus's hair and asked softly, "Are you ready to join with it, Andrea?"

"What?" Andrealphus asked weakly, not daring to look up.

"Are you ready to join with your true Heart again, Andrealphus? Your _complete_ Heart? You've rebuilt it, and it'd be a shame if all that hard work is for naught now, wouldn't it?"

"How can I join with it -- it's _dead_!" Andrealphus mourned hoarsely.

"Indeed. But that's not the question I was hoping you'd ask," Eli said wistfully. "Take another look at it, Andrea. A close, careful look."

Andrealphus tensed, but he was too worn out to muster any anger. Instead he meekly studied the Heart again, trying to compare it to a memory of times long past. "There's... This section here, it wasn't like this, was it?" he ventured falteringly.

Eli gave him an encouraging nod.

After more scrutinizing, Andrealphus spotted several places where physical fact didn't quite match up with memory.

"There are pieces still missing," Andrealphus sighed in defeat. "Key pieces."

Eli smiled and held out his hands like a cup. "Not anymore, Andrea. I gathered the last pieces from those who held them for you. Here." In his hands lay the missing pieces of Love's Heart. One for every Archangel who had picked one up and joined them with their own Hearts. Dream, Flowers, Fire, Purity, War, Stone, Judgment...

Andrealphus swallowed as he stared at them.

"Are you ready?" asked Eli again.

"No. But it doesn't matter."

Andrealphus took the first of the last pieces from Eli and worked it into the Heart. Then he took the next, and with great difficulty managed to join it into a pristine section of the crystal. When he then puzzled Fire's piece into the whole, something stirred inside. A soft glow, so faint that he thought he was only imagining it, awoke deep within the Heart. Purity's piece followed, then War and Stone and Judgment. The glow grew in intensity, and his fingers tingled as they touched the Heart.

Andrealphus trembled as he looked up at Eli. "There's still one piece missing," he told the ancient Archangel. "This isn't complete."

Eli nodded. "You've got the spark of passion, but the spark of _life_ isn't there." He tapped the Heart with a fingernail, and it sang in response. "Are you ready for it?" he asked for the third time.

"I don't know, Eli. All I know is that I yearn to finish this. I can't bear to see it like this, so close to completion and yet lacking," Andrealphus answered miserably. One way or the other, he wanted to fulfill this. It was too late to turn away now.

Eli smiled then, from ear to ear. "I thought you'd _never_ get wise to it. Excellent!" From thin air, he produced a Heart. A living, pulsating Heart that sang joyously with the harmonics of all Creation.

Andrealphs gaped at it, as he felt its warmth and radiance embrace him.

"The last piece of Love's Heart is here," Eli indicated a spot on his Heart. "Take it, and put it back where it belongs."

After a long, desperately frightened hesitation, Andrealphus reached out with trembing hands and removed the final piece from its resting place with Creation. Eli's Heart sang sadly as it let the shard go, but the harmonics were also vibrating with anticipatory joy, as it reformed itself to its original perfection.

The shard tingled and glowed between Andrealphus's fingers, surging to life as he brought it nearer to where it had been all those millennia ago. It all but leapt from his hand and lodged itself back in its place.

And the world changed to become a better place.

* * *


End file.
